>Now there is nn way I can see for alternative institutiosns to ever replace captialist institutions before a revolution, or even serve as a material base for most action. Soup kitchens and free clinics depend on donations. They can't by their nature replace economic institutions that produce profits, at least not while capitalism exists. And alternative instituions such food co-ops or workers owned and run small buisinesses generally do not produce huge surpluses of money to contribute or labor or space or resources.
That might simply be down to bad management though. By the sounds of it, the co-op you are talking about has almost no management at all, which is not a survival characteristic in the current environment.
> I simply do not ever see that them providing the kind of material base, say, a radicalized labor movement could.
Actually there's a more fundamental problem. What most people fail to grasp is that it isn't the ability of such alternative economic structures to compete effectively in the marketplace and so forth, it is simply the fact that they must compete in the marketplace and the co-op members as individuals must survive in an economic environment where insecurity is prevalent.
People just don't seem to get this intuitively, but it is very important to understand it.
For a start, it is a false conception to imagine that an "anarchist" or "socialist" community can truly exist within a capitalist society. By "anarchistic" I take it you mean socialistic in the sense of providing economic freedom and security for all members of the community. However this is simply not possible in the wider context of a capitalist society. In such a society the only way to achieve some measure of economic security and freedom is by becoming a capitalist. In other words by joining the ruling class who, by definition, monopolise these privileges.
I have been a housing co-operative member for many years and this problem is a recurrent nightmare.
The simple fact is that a co-operative or intentional community cannot provide both economic security and economic freedom for all of its members, or at least not while any of them remain members of the working class. Being working class means one must work, usually but not necessarily, for someone else, in order to earn an income to live.
Economic freedom would mean the freedom to choose *not* to work, to do something else with one's energies. Economic security is somewhat more practical to achieve, but it still involves some guarantees of security. (If they are *not* members of the working class, of course they have no need for a co-operative.) Unless both economic security and freedom are guaranteed, the community can only be, at best, philosophically socialist (or "anarchist".)
I believe it is basic human nature to seek economic freedom and security. Co-operatives can realistically hope to provide some greater degree of security for members, they might even be a vehicle for helping to achieve ultimate economic emancipation in society at large. But it is simply utopian to believe that members of a co-operative can achieve this in isolation.
It certainly wouldn't be "anarchistic" even if it could be achieved. because such a community, thriving in a sea of suffering exploited humanity, would require considerable coercive force to protect the privileges of its members.
>But both the relieving of suffering, and the potential propaganda roles are not to be underestimated. Supose co-ops like the (Winpeg) Mondragon Co-op were everywhere - resteraunts, food stores - not some gigantic percentage of the economy, but enough so that everyone came into the contact with them. Then they would be a way for ordinary workers to be exposed to the idea that workers could own and run their own workplaces - that it is possible to be boss free.
But they wouldn't be boss free. If membership actually provided significant benefits, then everyone would desire those benefits. How would you defend those membership privileges against outsiders who wanted a slice of the pie? You would have to use force, because privilege is only sustained by force.
Bill Bartlett Bracknell tas